Today in History

1587 – England’s Queen Elizabeth I signs warrant for execution of her cousin, Mary Queen of Scots.

1790 – First session of the United States Supreme Court.

1842 – The Fifeshire arrives in Nelson with immigrants for the New Zealand Company’s first settlement in the South Island.

1861 – Texas secedes from the Union, precipitating the American Civil War. 1884 – First 10 volumes of Oxford English Dictionary published.

1896 – La Boheme, by Giacomo Puccini, premieres in Turin, Italy.

1922 – Janet Mackenzie becomes the first teacher in what was to become NZ’s Correspondence School for Backblock Children.

1959 – Swiss referendum rejects female suffrage in federal elections. 1965 – Martin Luther King and 700 civil rights demonstrators are arrested in Selma, Alabama.

1966 – Death of US film actor and director Buster Keaton.

1978 – Harriet Tubman becomes the first African American woman to appear on a US postage stamp.

1979 – Ayatollah Khomeini returns to Iran after 15 years in exile.

1981 – Trevor Chappell bowls underarm to protect Australia’s lead in a one-day international against New Zealand in Melbourne.

1991 – South African President FW de Klerk announces he will scrap all remaining apartheid laws.

2003 – Space shuttle Columbia breaks up while entering the atmosphere, killing all seven crew members. 2021 – The military seize power in Myanmar, ousting de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

Birthdays

John Ford, US film director (1894-1973); Anastasio Somoza, Nicaraguan dictator (1896-1956); Clark Gable, US actor (1901-60); Muriel Spark, UK novelist (1918-2006); Denis Adam, NZ philanthropist (1924-2018); Boris Yeltsin, Russian politician (1931-2007); Terry Jones, UK comedian (1942-2020); Peter Fulton, NZ cricketer (1979-); Harry Styles, UK singer (1994-).